BEMSEE Thunderbikes Snetterton 300 - Race Review (2016)

Last weekend we made the 200+ mile journey to the fantastic Snetterton 300 circuit to take part in the final round of the 2016 Thunderbike championship. We hadn't visited Snetterton since 2011 (when racing CB500s with ThundersportGB) but setting up in the paddock near where we did five years ago made it feel like we'd never been away!

About as full as our van gets!

Greeted by an orange moon...

The Friday test day had a promising start, with the track looking like it would stay dry for the morning session before a "chance" of some rain showers moving in towards the afternoon.

Early on the Friday...

...was dry but misty

Before we had a chance to take advantage of the dry track, an early rain shower landed. We went out in the wet first session of the day and re-learned our way around the Snetterton 300 layout. Some corners were a bit tighter than we remembered, but it didn't take long to feel comfortable with where we were going.

When we returned from the first session heavy rain landed on us, then we were treated to some impressive thunderstorms! We decided to sacrificed a couple of test sessions to fit some new tyres (a full set of wets and a dry rear) and then headed out in one of the afternoon sessions to test the new wet tyres, as Dunlop have apparently stopped making the British-made KR393 tyres have replaced them with the French-made KR389s instead. We couldn't tell any difference on-track - so this change makes little difference to us!

With so much standing water on the circuit we decided it wasn't worth the risk to keep circulating so called it a day after returning in from the afternoon session, as the weekend forecast was looking a lot better - light rain showers on Saturday and then a dry Sunday! We got a night sunset too...

Photo by Mikey Smith

The weather forecast (as usual) turned out to be way off! With 40-50mph winds doing their best to destroy awnings overnight, it was very wet for our qualifying session. The 12-minute qualifying session turned out to be a 4-lap dash for everyone with most people putting in their fastest lap on their final lap - including us! We managed our best qualifying position of the BEMSEE season and qualified in 6th position (on the 2nd row!) for the Saturday race.

The rain kept on falling through the day, and competitors kept on spilling oil and fuel onto the track as well! In particular, a severe fuel leak contaminated the circuit meaning that a 2-hour clean-up operation was required. These delays meant that we once again had our two planned 5-lap races combined into a single 8-lap race.

Starting from our sixth place grid position, we got a great start to take fourth position into the first corner. We were circulating in around fifth position when an oil spill caused a lot of falls (which almost included us twice - at 9:00 and 11:30 in the video below). The race was red-flagged and stopped on lap 5 of 8 when we had moved up to 2nd position.

It was decided that the race would be re-run over 4 laps. At the restart (after a lengthy delay), we took second place in the race which we kept until the last lap when we were overtaken. But we managed to get a fantastic drive out of the final corner and retook 2nd place at the flag by 0.047 of a second and only 2.752 seconds behind the race winner, to achieve our first ever BEMSEE podium!

In the traditional Saturday night awards presentation, we were over the moon and collected our trophy for the fantastic 2nd place finish in the Saturday BEMSEE Thunderbike race.

Our first ever BEMSEE trophy!

We woke to a much drier day on Sunday, with the track only damp in a few places when we went out for the first of our two Sunday races. Our 2nd place finish on Saturday gave us 2nd position on the starting grid for Sunday's first race.

When the race began we got a good start and kept our 2nd position into the first corner and through the first half of the first lap - when we moved up a position to take the lead! After leading for almost a lap, we were demoted to second place and then back to third place a few laps later - which we managed to keep to the line to take our first DRY podium at BEMSEE!

Our first BEMSEE trophy in DRY conditions

With the 3rd place finish in the first Sunday race, it gave us another front row start for the final race of our weekend. We initially made a good start but the quicker R6 on grid position two made a shocker of a start and then pushed us to the inside of the circuit and boxed us in, so we left the first corner in 6th position.

Throughout the first half of the race we were part of a close battle for 2nd position, but on lap 4 of 6 (at 8:08 in the video below) Jack Willis' SV650 blew up in front of us and covered us in oil and engine bits! When this happened we backed off and it cost us three seconds and a race position. When Jack pulled off the track, we went easy for a few corners to check our tyres were clean and then rode hard to get back up to 6th position at the flag.

With our successful final round we end the season just outside the championship Top 10, after competing in 5 of the 8 rounds (18 of the 30 championship races). We also scored points in every race that we finished - which is also a nice achievement in such a strong championship.

The BEMSEE Thunderbike championship is now over, but we still have one event left in our 2016 season - the "Stars at Darley" event at Darley Moor on Sunday 9th October. We have already won our championships at Darley Moor but will still be in attendance - so if you visit please come by and say "Hi!"  :-)